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It's not going to be awkward unless Clippard stinks anytime soon, in which case, Johnson will make the switch. Storen will be in lower leverage situations until he gets comfortable. The same type of quotes went on recently with Wang as the fifth starter, and Detwiler was back in the rotation before any statement to the effect had a chance to be batted about the columns. They let a guy keep his job until they don't, you can ask Lannan.

Clippard has been great, but so has Stammen. Really the bullpen outside of Lidge has been wonderful. I'd rather see Storen come back in a role where they can pick and choose his spots, not "oh, he's the closer so he has to pitch the ninth even though he's thrown three days in a row."

Yeah, Clippard is too good to be closer, but he'd be pretty stupid not to want the role where he can make the most money. I think when it becomes obvious Storen is back to where he was, he'll close because those were the "roles" DJ had set for bullpen. There would just have to be some little event to make it a smooth transition.

Y'all are forgetting about the pink polka-dotted elephant on the 15-day DL, namely Henry Rodriguez. Subsequently you must hope that Davey Johnson forgets about "loyalty" and all that and only brings in Oh Henry when the run differential in the game is greater than 10 runs, winning or losing.

The theory last year was that they had the perfect mix with Clippard as set up man and Storen as closer.
By the way, Clippard had a 6.33 ERA with a 1.704 WHIP with the Yankees and never did live up to his nickname..the Yankee Clippard. (According to BR. He was even worse than I remembered there.)

Dear Davey, please give some consideration to not automatically putting in Clippard on those (very rare) occasions when we're up by three runs in the ninth. We don't want to risk his arm falling off just so that he can pad his stats with easy saves.

as a Yankees fan, I am frightened and confused by Tyler Clippard being described as "dominant"

IIRC, the Yanks had Clippard throwing his curve a lot when they wanted him to be a starter and it was a lousy pitch, a perfect complement to his no command high 80s fastball. I don't think he always had the change up he had now, so it is fair to say that the Tyler Clippard who started for the Yankees no longer exists. I wonder if the Nats just taught him how to throw a better change or if just plays way up in the bullpen.

He did have a pretty good Major League debut, but otherwise was just awful.

[13] Clippard always had a good change. The biggest difference between then and now is a bump in velocity after moving to the bullpen (though Clippard has expressed in interviews it was less due to bullpen move and more due to physical/mechanical maturation) and improved command. I was always a big fan of Clippard's so I'm really happy to see him doing well.

I was always a big fan of Clippard's so I'm really happy to see him doing well.

As have I. As stupid as it is, I really like his "look." He's so unapologetically NERDY, with his late '70s "Dungeons & Dragons fan" mulletlike hair and awkward glasses and beanpole physique. He looks like he just climbed out the basement of the science building proudly wielding an 8-sided die and a meticulously-created character sheet for a half-elven ranger.

The guy with the fastest fastball or curviest curve ball? The guy who simply keeps additional runs from scoring regardless of his stuff, K rate, BB rate, runners allowed, etc.?

This is really just my personal bias, but I judge relievers on a purely results-oriented basis: either you get guys out and keep runs off the board or you don't, and if you don't I really don't care how good your 'stuff' is or how many you're capable of striking out. Relievers are the purest of situational players, and I'm therefore far less concerned with their underlying peripherals (except in the sense that it gives me a sense of how likely they are to continue succeeding) than the actual outcome.

He's so unapologetically NERDY, with his late '70s "Dungeons & Dragons fan" mulletlike hair and awkward glasses and beanpole physique. He looks like he just climbed out the basement of the science building proudly wielding an 8-sided die and a meticulously-created character sheet for a half-elven ranger.

Dead on. He has a perfect "autograph request proof" look..nobody would buy him as a big league reliever.

With Henry and Lidge out and gone, respectively, the last couple innings have been much more peaceful for Nationals fans. At least if we could average more than 2.6 runs a game, or whatever it is.

As have I. As stupid as it is, I really like his "look." He's so unapologetically NERDY, with his late '70s "Dungeons & Dragons fan" mulletlike hair and awkward glasses and beanpole physique. He looks like he just climbed out the basement of the science building proudly wielding an 8-sided die and a meticulously-created character sheet for a half-elven ranger.

Plus, during his stint with the Yankees, he had, I swear, the absolute worst acne I've ever seen on a major league ballplayer

He's so unapologetically NERDY, with his late '70s "Dungeons & Dragons fan" mulletlike hair and awkward glasses and beanpole physique. He looks like he just climbed out the basement of the science building proudly wielding an 8-sided die and a meticulously-created character sheet for a half-elven ranger.

He is my wife's favorite player for exactly this reason. She will tolerate the Nats, but when Clippard comes on she will exclaim, "It's THE NERD!" and sit down and watch.

[9] It's a myth that the setup guy in general gets more important innings than the closer. Last year Storen had a higher % of high leverage innings than Clippard: See here

This is misleading, as it considers leverage across all batters faced rather than the leverage when the pitcher first entered the game. A pitcher who pitches well is going to reduce the leverage of the appearance as his appearance progresses, and vice versa.

Storen and Clippard were both excellent a year ago. Here's a breakdown of their overall percentages of batters faced in various situations described as high, medium and low leverage (via Baseball-Reference.com).

In 2011 these two pitchers appeared in almost exactly the same number of relief appearances: 72 for Clippard and 73 for Storen. However, Clippard entered 3 more games with high leverage in the first plate appearance, 1 more game with medium leverage in the first plate appearance and 4 fewer games with low leverage in the first plate appearance.

Storen seemingly had the benefit of entering lots of clean 9th innings. He entered almost 50% more games with no one on base than Clippard did, and had 59 appearances of exactly 1 inning versus 34 for Clippard.